Multiple users locked out due to "unauthorised Steam refunds"

Update: Chris Wilson has joined the discussion. All incorrectly placed bans have been lifted. As a matter of fact, all bans from the responsible wave have been lifted, so that Grinding Gear Games can carefully sift through each and every one of the accounts which triggered their latest fraud filter, to make sure that the same issue does not occur again.

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A number of player accounts have reportedly received unmerited bans mere hours before the launch of Path of Exile’s 3.5.0 content update.

Reddit user zackford went down the investigative rabbit-hole, having been locked out of his Path of Exile account “just over 12 hours” before Path of Exile: Betrayal’s launch.

Upon attempting to log in, users affected by the irregular ban wave are greeted with a message vaguely stating they’ve been banned by an administrator, while the Path of Exile website offers little more in terms of information – “Banned due to issuing unauthorised Steam refund”.

After a short back and forth with Grinding Gear Games Customer Support, zackford, who claims to have not requested a single Steam-related charge-back since his first date with Wraeclast, was informed the ban was issued due to an unauthorized refund on an Ascendant Supporter Pack purchased November 2015.

Upon further inspection, zackford was, in fact, able to locate a refund of that same transaction within his Steam account – a refund he had no recollection of ever requesting. Steam Support confirmed his suspicions once he managed to get a hold of them, “Back in 2015 we accidentally and improperly refunded your Ascendant Pack. This was an error in our fraud protection system.” The support representative also promises to extend the information internally to the appropriate Grinding Gear Games team.

It’s truly unfortunate that numerous long-time players and supporters have missed out on the launch of Betrayal, and we hope the matter is resolved as soon as possible.